Tag Archives: photography

I miss the deciduous trees. The winter sculptures that remind us of our bare bones. Like metal fingers in the sky that warn against the cold. Stay quiet. Stay inside by the fire. It’s time to rest.
Here the conifers flaunt themselves against the snow and grey. The only technicolor. The only promise. Come on out and ski and sled and snowshoe and dogsled and have a snowball fight. Make a fort. You can hide in our skirts if you get cold.

I want to rest this winter. I want to play on the pages of the novel I’m writing. I want to incubate by the fire in a robe with tea. And be reminded that the trees will hold up the sky without me.

I’m hanging up a Gone Fishin’ sign for August to enjoy summer with my family and do some good old fashioned novel-writing. Enjoy the rest of your summer and I’ll see you in September! Here are a few highlights of the last few weeks of Montana-ness. yrs. Laura

I love this song. This time of year, I hear it in my mind when I take my evening walks. In the spirit of my last post, I thought I’d include this video I found on youtube which shows a lovely slide show of a wintery Switzerland, and gives some familiar Montana-esque images to this gorgeous song. Take a moment, pour yourself something warm to drink, and enjoy. From my snowy home to yours. (you have to click the Watch This Video on Youtube” option to view it…)

Congratulations to E. Victoria Flynn of http://www.pennyjars.blogspot.com!!!
YOU WIN A FREE SIGNED BOOK! My kids (the judges of this contest– skilled out-of-the-barn thinkers) are die hard Dr. Seussians and have always loved this story about racial profiling, even though they see it simply as a tale about the pain and trouble that ensues when we live in a world of Us/Them. Thank you, Victoria!

AND THANKS TO ALL WHO PARTICIPATED! Your wit and outside-the-barn thinking truly mesmerized me. I have some of the coolest blog readers around, and for that I am deeply thankful. When I started this blog a year ago and had zero readers (okay, maybe my mother), I never dreamed that I would find an audience out there in cyberland, and especially one so loyal and supportive. You all teach me so much. Thank you for showing up here at These Here Hills. The next contest will be announced soon… Hint: turn to page 301 of my book (THIS IS NOT THE STORY YOU THINK IT IS)

I’m going to be travelling in the next few weeks doing book promo in the New York, Hartford, and Chicago areas, so I may be thin on the blog entries… yrs. Laura

Hello, everybody. I’ve been having fun barn chasing this summer– which is how, at least this gal, deals with FINALLY getting a book published after 20 years and all that comes along with it. Better than therapy. Thinking outside-the-box as a practice is a total blast. I encourage you to try it. What designs do you see in the world over and over? For me it’s often heart-shaped things, especially rocks. But as a little girl growing up in Illinois, it was always faces in barn fronts. Living in Montana, there are lots of opportunities to engage this childhood fantastical thinking.TO THAT END:

To enter the contest, simply send in your best shot at naming the above barn in the comment section here on this post. Is it a celebrity? A concept? A country? A kind of sandwich? Let your common sense go and dream a little. It’s good for you.
The winner WINS A SIGNED FIRST EDITION copy of my book THIS IS NOT THE STORY YOU THINK IT IS. This contest will be judged by a team of highly skilled professional out-of-the-box thinkers: my two kids. (14 and 10. Girl and a boy, to be gender fair, but hopefully not ageist, as I’ll probably weigh in too. And probably my husband too– 44 years old, each of us.)

Additional opportunity for the extra outside-of-the-boxers: A signed book will also be sent to the person who sends in the best original barn photo and name…

Please feel free to pass this contest and link along to your friends. Imagine what could happen with a whole lot of people thinking outside-the-box and sharing as much. (Even if you live in the city, I bet there are barns in your life somewhere. If not, feel free to name any building that has a face to you and submit that photo. Could be really interesting…)

To get the out-of-the-box juices flowing, you can see what I did on my summer vacation here:

Have you guys been following my recent obsession? Barns. The fact that they have faces? I’ve been posting them on this blog in the EVERY BARN HAS A FACE category and literally taking off like an addict during the day to stalk barns all around Montana. It’s all I can do to NOT do it right now. And I finally figured out why: I am so interested in perspective and perception and assumtions and expectations. I’m so interested in seeing how they mess with us and inform our reactions. Often, we’ve already made our minds up about something before it’s even happened. We do ourselves such a disservice in this regard. What if we assigned different meaning to the things and people we encounter in our day? What if we surprised ourselves by changing the entry point of our interactions? I think we’d find some freedom there. I think we’d find some humor there too.

Here’s a challenge: Keep a camera in your car. If you are driving anywhere where you might see a barn…look at it like it has a face. Allow yourself to see it. What’s your knee jerk reaction? Who is it for you? Now inspire yourself to turn around, to seize the moment and stop. Take a photo. And send it in to: laura@lauramunsonauthor.com. Tell me “who” your barn is, and I’ll post it in my EVERY BARN HAS A FACE section of this blog. We’ll have some fun. We’ll think outside of the box (barn). We’ll remind ourselves of the power of stopping and playing with life. We’ll take ourselves a little less seriously and in so doing, dare I suggest: we’ll lighten the collective load.
Here’s what I’ve been up to below.http://lauramunson.wordpress.com/category/every-barn-has-a-face/

Have you ever noticed that every barn has a face? I grew up in the Mid-west and my parents liked to travel and money was tight. That meant there was a lot of time spent in the family station wagon, staring out the window as corn-fields met rocky mountains and oceans, depending on whether we took a left or a right. I saw a lot of barns. And every one of them had a face. I’d keep it to myself because this sort of thinking didn’t go over too well in my family. I was the youngest. I was always saying things that got either patronizing responses or just chirp chirp. I had a relationship with those barns. I still do. So much of how we relate to life is as the beholder. Beauty, barns, and otherwise. I’d love it if you shared your barns with me here. I’d love to see those faces. I’d love to see that you see them too.
yrs.
Laura